The U.S. Congress proposes a day of commemoration for the collection of funds for the Armenians.

July to March 1917

The Turkish Army on the Caucasian Front loses 60,000 men to starvation, disease and other causes, leaving effectively only 20,000. Marshal Liman von Sanders attributes these losses to the destruction of Turkish agricultural production because of the deportations of the Armenians.

July 19

The U.S. House of Representatives adopts the resolution introduced in the U.S. Senate establishing a day of commemoration for the Armenian victims.

July 23

In order to further the Islamization and Turkification of the Armenian remnants in the Hawran District, all the Armenian clerics found there are murdered by the Turks.

July 23

The proposal is made to the Armenian military doctors in Sivas that they become Muslims. Almost all refuse and are at once killed.

August 1

The Interior Ministry abolishes the Armenian Patriarchate and the legal rights of the Armenian community (the Millet Ermeni) on the grounds that there was no Armenian community left in Turkey.

200,000 Armenian deportees are reported killed in massacres by this date in the Zor District, at a delta formed by the juncture of the Khabur and Euphrates River near Suwar (Suvar), Marrat (Marat), and Elbusayra.

September 3

A five member commission of Turks arrives in the Hawran District to convert the Armenian deportees to Islam.

Turkish authorities enter American consular offices to search for British records.

September 29

The German Cabinet, in its 86th session, discusses the Armenian massacres.

October 3

Count Wolff-Metternich leaves his post as ambassador to Turkey, recalled by the German General Staff at the request of Enver because he had protested against the Armenian massacres. Wilhelm Radowitz is interim ChargÈ d'affaires for Germany until November 16 and the arrival of the new ambassador, Richard von Kuhlmann.

October 4

Wilhelm Radowitz reports to the German Chancellor Theobald von Bethman Hollweg that of the two million Armenians in Turkey, one and half million had been deported. Of these 1,175,000 were dead; 325,000 were still living.

October 5

The Turkish government confiscates by a provisional law all the real estate of the Armenians.

October 8 and October 9

U.S. President Woodrow Wilson, acting on the resolution of Congress, proclaims these two days "Armenian Relief Days."

October 11

A highly secret Ittihad convention is convened in Constantinople to review existing policy toward the Armenians and to decide on a future course of action.

November 16

Richard von Kuhlmann is appointed as the new German ambassador in Constantinople. He serves until July 1917, when he is promoted to the office of Foreign Minister.

December 4

Omer Naji, an inspector-general of the Ittihad Committee, is reported to have announced that Ittihad is seeking to organize a purely Turkish state.